CD Japan review and some outfit shots

Hello everyone!

As promised, here is a review that was based off of an online shopping excursion that I had done back in July (with the exact date being July 16, 2014). What prompted me to make the order was my obsessive urge to get into owning a copy of the latest issue of the Gothic and Lolita Bible, which will have the images shown below for more detail. In addition, ever since I had started sewing, I had been heavily interested into learning how to sew Lolita clothes, and as a result had decided to buy the latest Otome no Sewing edition as well (which I believe at this rate is the fifth edition). So without further ado, listed below are the details on the order process as well as CDJapan as a whole.

Website Link: http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/

Books Ordered and Prices

• Boutique sha / Otome no Sewing BOOK Tezukuri Lolita Fashion (Handmade Lolita Fashion Clothes) 5 (Lady Boutique Sha) - 1,111 yen or 10 USD 
• Jack Media / Gothic & Lolita Bible Vol.52 [Cover] Nakamura Asumiko (Jack Media MOOK) - 12 USD  
• Total amount = 3,817 yen or around $40 (including shipping)

NOTE: The names are exactly as shown on the website. 

Shipping
After some tumultuous decision making at hand, I eventually decided on using SAL shipping over EMS or Registered Mail, primarily because 1) I have a lot of confidence in my postal carrier, 2) It is the most cheapest shipping option available, and 3) I did not feel like spending a lot of my funds on shipping at this point in time. 

If I were to give an opinion on transit time, I definitely agree with what the staff at CDJapan listed on their website in terms of transit times. In this case, orders shipped by SAL takes about 7-14 business days, which I agree with.

In addition to shipping times, you will need to take into consideration availability times, which can sometimes vary depending on how fast the staff can get it shipped to what I presume is their warehouse of sorts from the suppliers. In this case, the Otome no Sewing book took longer to be "ready to ship" compared to the GLB, with the availability time being 5-7 days in comparison to GLB's 1-2 days. However, I felt that both books had gotten shipped out in a short period of time, and therefore did not really disturb the process much.

Delivery and Packaging  

As expected from any package sent by SAL, no signature was needed and as a result you may find the package lying on your doorstep. With that being said, the package was nicely taped on both sides of the flat box as well as taped on the inside to secure the contents. The box itself was just large enough to fit around the books, which was a pleasant surprise considering that most boxes tend to be on the bulky side.

The amount of detail (and the high quality pictures) are amazing, which made me think that the purchase was worthwhile. Ever since the items arrival, I have had the chance and opportunity to take a look at both of them further. While not a self-proclaimed Japanese language expert, I can safely say that for those who are planning on getting the books that they are wonderful to just even look at without having to understand the contents. I will say however that you may have a tough time with understanding the Otome no Sewing book at first, since the instructions are kind of hard (to me anyway) to understand without reading the Japanese aspect. Of course when looking at the pictures long enough, it makes the whole process easier. Patterns are incorporated into both books, with more in the Otome no Sewing book compared to the GLB as expected. 

Conclusion: Overall the order process went smoothly. Am I willing to order from CDJapan again? Probably will if not for more chances to get the GLBs! 

Just to close off the post, here are some outfit shots that I had taken on occasions. I am aware that it has been quite some time since I had posted any outfits, but I had been busy with job hunting lately! 

An Overdue Post - A Compilation of the Past Months Part 3

Hello everyone,

It has officially been about roughly two months since my last update. While suppose to be a semi-continuation to the previous post, the update was a bit late in being posted. I am aware that my updates has been severely slowing down as of late and I honestly do not know what to do in regards to this issue. Ever since summer started and after I had finished an international financing course that I had taken back in May, I had been severely lacking in terms of motivating myself. Now I am aware that this particular situation has been going on for some time, so I am going to try and resolve it to the best of my abilities and see if my motivational drive will come back. The reason why I think that this is purely motivational-based is because my activity level had remained purely the same (if not a little lower) compared to before, and I greatly want to share that with you. So with that being said, I greatly appreciate the support that you had all showed and would like to thank you for bearing with me despite my lack of posting. Without further ado, here are the activities that I had done during the time in-between.

During one of my excursions to H&M, I had gotten this adorable shiny heart earring set that was on sale. I realized that I did not have a set like this before so I figured why not? The pair that was missing from the set were green hearts that I know I will never wear in the future, and so decided to give them to my friend.

An Overdue Post - A Compilation of the Past Months Part 1

Hello everyone!

It has been quite some time since I had updated the blog. I will not lie, I find myself drained and completely lacking in motivation to post up content, despite the fact that I have numerous photos that I had taken in the last several months and had been very eager to share them. I am not entirely certain if I am completely out of this unmotivated stated that I had found myself in, so I am going to take it easy and post a compilation or summary of all of the activities that I have done. In the time that I had gone as well as ever since realizing my love for the Lolita fashion, I had already purchased some more acquisitions, particularly pertaining to Angelic Pretty, which I find is quickly becoming my favourite Lolita brand.

A Late Bodyline Order Post

Hello everyone!

Major apologies for neglecting my blog for so long! It has been pretty much forever since I had updated, and I truly felt bad about it. Since I am getting so close to finishing up my studies, I had been putting a greater focus on that rather than anywhere else. Sadly, this also (if you cannot tell already) had been negatively affecting my blog activities. I will try and make up for it for the upcoming couple of weeks, since winter break had just hit. Speaking of winter break, I cannot believe that Christmas is only a couple of days away! Yikes! Better get some shopping done!

Anyway, since I had not blogged in a long time, all of the news that I will be bringing to the table will be pretty much old news. This includes a Bodyline and Taobao lolita haul that I had made back in November, as well as my attendance at the anime convention in my city. Just for the sake of keeping posts short, I will be mainly blogging about the Bodyline order for the time being. In addition, I will not be doing a review, since I personally feel that most (if not all) Bodyline reviews had been done to death to the point where mostly everyone gets the general idea of how their order process goes, as well as their quality.

With that being said and done, let's get down to business! I had bought L329 JSK in pink sized M as well as two 251 "tea parties" lookalikes in colours white and pink. As the icing on the cake (and mainly as one of those "additional cheap things to throw in your cart to make the shipping worthwhile"), I had also purchased two pairs of wrist cuffs in 1078 pink and 1029 in off-white. Oddly enough, both wrist cuffs were "on sale" at the time, which was why I had bought them in the first place over the other wrist cuffs.

Huge accessories haul from Ardene and Claires + A surprise item

Hello everyone!

For those that are curious if I had dropped off the face of the Earth as of yet, rest assured that I am still alive and kicking! I am just being bombarded by the constant swamp that is called homework, as always whenever the school year comes around. Since I currently have a long weekend, I figured that I might as well create a blog post while I still have this time window available!

Anyway, since I had been hectic with pretty much everything lately, whether it be just studying, working on numerous assignments, or just working, I had not really been doing much. However, I did go on a somewhat moderate accessory haul a while back, and had decided to hit up both of my favourite accessory shops, Ardene and Claires (though I don't usually shop at Claires as much as Ardene, and I shopped there this time because of a discount card)! I haven't bought anything in a while back then and I wanted some new tights and fresh accessories to flesh out my collection!

Just as a heads up, some of the lighting in the photos will look a little bit darker than usual, but that is because I had taken these pictures a few hours before evening.  

Ardene haul

Nothing screams hime more than pink rose tights

I had been looking for this particular style necklace for centuries! I am so glad that I had found it!

I will admit, this necklace had not really been my absolute favourite, but I got it anyway to fulfill discount requirements.

Yay for accessories that happens to be matching!

 

Claires haul

I had seriously eyed this charm bracelet ever since it had hit stores. It is extremely cute yet has an elegant feel to it, especially with the tea cup and tea pot! I did not get it before because it was not on sale at the moment.

Of course getting more roses doesn't hurt...

This had just recently happened, but today have been the release date of the latest pokemon games, which are Pokemon X and Y! I had gotten the X version while my friend had gotten the Y version to enable easier trading! :) I had been very excited all day over this particular game and can't wait to play it! 

Hime Creations Series, Prisila Half-wig, and Misc + Claires Haul

Hello everyone!

Time sure flies when you are having fun, especially when it is during the month of August and that the school term is quickly advancing. In some cases, it might've even arrived for a couple of you judging from a couple of posts that I had seen so far. ^^; Like I had previously mentioned, I want to savour what precious moments I have and get more to crafting in particular, since I have a feeling that I will not be able to do as much during the school year.

I had already created a couple of jewelery pieces, which so far consists of a choker and a couple of rings. Main inspirations were from Himena's Princess Melody line (in particular her early release chokers, but with a touch of lace) and PinkHime's famous rose or "crosage" ring. 

On the side, I had (finally) ordered a half-wig off of Moery and it had arrived a couple of weeks ago! The half-wig that I had ordered is the famous J-807 in the colour TBK to match with my black hair, since I honestly don't feel like dying it and what-not. I had only gotten the half-wig, since I think that 1) it is a great hair piece to start off with and 2) it will take me a while to get used to the weight on the back of my head.
 
Regarding Prisila itself, the half-wig came wrapped up nicely in a small bag. A "wig-net" keeps the half-wig secure in the packaging and preventing it from being tangled. Quality-wise,  it feels really nice and as you can see from the pictures below, it blends in nicely with my own hair. Now I'm not really an expert on hair pieces, so I will just leave it at that, but I will say that it is definitely worth the $60 something dollars that I had forked over.

Now if only I can find a way to make the bump bigger so hair accessories can sit perfectly without it looking all awkward...

    

Now for the hauls! For the miscellaneous one, I had helped place an order at Cool Pencil Case for my sister's back to school shopping, and had ordered a couple of items myself. If you are a huge fan of cute mechanical pencils like I am, you would quickly notice that it can be extremely hard to find cute yet cheap stationary outside of a Chinatown, and even then it would still be on the pricey side. Though I think that most of the items on the site err on the pricey side of things as well, I find a couple of their mechanical pencils to be quite reasonable. Shipping is quite pricey however for anyone that lives outside of the states.   

For the Claires haul, after finding a dotted bow headband in the same colour (and material!) as one of my Yumetenbo dresses and after a little bit of persuasion from family, I caved in and bought the item. Naturally since all hair accessories are part of the "buy one get one 50% off" sale, I bought a black rose clip along with it when none of the other hair accessories had caught my eye. I am very low on black hair accessories as it is, so it all worked out in the end. In addition to the headband and the rose clip, I had bought a tiara that was on sale at the time. I had missed the time when tiaras were used predominantly in Himegyaru fashion, so hopefully I will be able to use it in future outfits once I get fully into Himegyaru. 

Now last but not least, I had splurged on a beautiful pair of floral and lace oxfords. Up until now, I did not have a pair of decent close-toed shoes with the exception of my extremely ancient pair of runners that I had since my junior high school days. Now I finally have something that is function yet fashionable! ^o^

   

Another Lifestyle Post: Movies, Outings, and Dinner

Hello everyone!

Once again, it has been a while since I had made my latest post, but lately I have been feeling a bit on the lazy side when it comes to posting. There will be no crafts or deco this time around, as it is strictly a lifestyle post. 

Back in July during the afternoon, my friend and I went to watch Pacific Rim during a Tuesday special. Unfortunately, there were a couple of complications when I got to the theater: 1) the movie we were planning on watching doesn't actually start until a later time, 2) the movie that was available at the time was the 3D version of the movie we were planning on watching, and 3) my friend was not there yet due to a prior phone call. At first we decided to switch the movie to Despicable Me 2, but thanks to the 1) numerous kids lining up and 2) the next showtime being roughly the same as the one with Pacific Rim, we ended up settling for watching Pacific Rim instead. With that being decided, we went to go kill some time, mainly in the forms of shopping and more shopping!

A Mostly Miscellaneous Haul (Plus Gifts!)

Hello everyone!

After the crazy shopping spree that I had gone through a month or so ago, I had been currently in a shopping "lull" to let my wallet have a slow but steady recovery. None-the-less, I did make a couple of purchases here and there, along with being given a couple of gifts from family! So without further ado, let's get rolling! This time there won't be a lot of clothes involved, surprisingly enough!

Hanging out with a friend and a followup with Yumetenbo

Hello everyone!

I had been contemplating on creating a lifestyle post or "life-post", a post that basically goes on about the daily happenings that takes place in my life. I haven't created one as of yet, and am a bit hesitant to do so, since I am still a bit private when it comes to personal affairs. However, it doesn't hurt to try out new things, and that is exactly what I am going to do here! Also, I am pretty sure that you all might be getting bored from my constant haul posts, which I will be doing in this post later on anyway! xD Really need to start getting on the craft train already!

Anyway, I hung out with my friend on Victoria Day, which was on last Monday. I will not mention her name for privacy reasons, but we had mainly gone to H&M for our shopping needs. :) Here are a couple of outfit shots that I had taken while I was in the change room. I was very excited about this outfit, since I had gotten the opportunity to incorporate a couple of my latest Yumetenbo pieces into it.

More Random Purchases!

Hello everyone!

I had been eager on wanting to make a crafts post for quite some time, but had never gotten around to doing it, which is a shame since I already have a ton of ideas in mind that are stored in the form of sticky notes stuck on an inspiration board. I had realized how messy my desk is and I had been slowly cleaning for goodness-knows how many days. ^^; On the bright side, I had been making a bunch of bows after realizing that I am dangerously low on them, especially on pink ones! (though lavender and sax bows doesn't hurt to make as well) Why would I be making some instead of just buying them you may ask? Well, I had already bought a ton of stuff off of some of the sites and I wanted to give my wallet a rest by keeping my hands busy. In the meantime, feel free to see some more purchases that I had made during my break and then some! 

I had decided to *gasp* place a couple of orders off of Gyaru Comm Sales. This is a pretty big step for me, since 1) I haven't placed an order from there before and 2) The site isn't really an actual store but rather a bunch of sellers and buyers gathered in one place. None-the-less, I was looking around to see if there were any good bargains available, particularly on Liz Lisa, since I did not own any from that brand. Now I am just picky with any particular type of clothing material, especially Liz Lisa, but I had managed to find something. How exciting! My first official brand clothing item, or so I thought.

I had bought this Liz Lisa dress that still has a tag on it. At first I had thought that it was authentic , until I had checked the tag that is...   

Really love the print on the dress!